CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

TOMMY

 

 

 

 

 

 

As I walked down the pier that Saturday morning, there was Bailey sitting on the bow of the Mailboat, feet dangling over the water, heels rocking back and forth. She had arrived even before me, and that was saying something.

I grinned. My last-minute mail jumper. Robb had called a couple nights ago with the change in plans. “That’s fine,” I’d said, heating up soup over the stove while Cubs vs. Reds played on the radio. “Tell her to wear something that dries fast.”

He laughed. We hung up. I turned off the soup and leaned on the stovetop, staring at the backsplash and smiling like a damned old fool. Bailey-girl. She’d made the team. Ten minutes went by before I realized the ball game was over and the Cubs had lost. It didn’t matter. Bailey was gonna be a mail jumper.

“Morning,” I called as I got closer to the boat. She was dressed in navy shorts, a white tee shirt with the cruise line logo, and a pair of running shoes. Her ponytail hung over her shoulder and her fly-away hair haloed her face, almost honey-blond in the morning sun.

“Morning!” She jumped down from the boat, landed on the dock, and bounced on her toes, her hands clasped behind her back. Looking at her now, so young and eager and innocent as a new-born day, it was hard to believe what she’d done. She’d called the police and turned in Baron Hackett. I didn’t know that from her or Robb or Chief Wade Erickson or anybody; I simply knew it. What else could explain Baron’s absence, Bailey’s presence, Robb’s hushed admission that Baron had apparently gotten into some trouble with the law? As inconceivable as it was that Baron could be the guilty party, it was even more stunning to me that Bailey, my shy little clamshell, had been courageous enough to report him.

It would take a while to wrap my mind around the whole thing. But in the meantime, one fact was immutable: Bailey stuck her neck out to do the right, hard thing and ended up a mail jumper. While Baron’s alleged crimes unsettled me on many levels, I guess I was okay with the outcome.

More than that. Something swelled in my chest like the lake before a storm. Pride. I hadn’t felt that since my son had graduated college; gotten a solid job; swept his way up the corporate ladder to higher echelons of responsibility. I’d never told him how I felt. I wasn’t sure I had the words to tell Bailey, either.

“What do you need me to do?” She grinned brightly, her cheeks flushed pink as if she’d run laps on the piers to burn off energy. She was clearly eager to begin her duties as a Lake Geneva mail jumper.

I hid my smile by bowing my head as I stuck my key in the lock. When I spoke, my voice adopted my old tone of a petty officer second class. “Grab some paper towels and wipe down these windows.” I held the door open for her. “I want ’em all gleaming.”

“Yes, sir!” Before I could remind her not to call me sir, she shot inside the boat and bee-lined for the cleaning closet in the aft.

I watched her go, shaking my head, then gazed over the lake. The water was azure blue and smooth as glass except where a family of ducks raised a few ripples below the boats. The sand grooming machine chugged along the nearby swimming beach, the operator whistling a little Frank Sinatra, one of my favorites, “That’s Life.” The trees along the shore were in full leaf, promising another glorious Lake Geneva summer full of laughter, cannon balls, and ice cream cones.

I sighed. This was going to be a good year.

I stepped into the boat to join my new mail jumper.